UnOrthodox

I love fairy tales. Actually, I love all stories that have some sort of fantastic element to them. The best ones, to me though, are the ones that seem very realistic only to have this incredible, sci-fi twist in them.

So I'm reading this new book (Actually it's a really REALLY old book with a new cover that looks cleverly oldish) by this guy G.K. Chesterton, who lived like about a hundred years ago. It's all about how people have lost their minds and fail to admit that there is any absolute truth. (And we thought this was a NEW problem!) And it's pretty interesting and then it happened...

I turned the page to Chapter 4 and there it was.

THE ETHICS OF ELFLAND.

My heart skipped a beat. I couldn't believe it. My mind starts racing. What amazing correlation to pointy ears and great archery skills could Chesterton possibly put in his book? Now this book is getting GOOD! So I read on as Chesterton tells how he learned all he needed about ethics and philosophy from fairy tales: chilvary & justice & pride from "Jack & the Beanstalk"; Humility & honor from "Cinderella"; love & inner beauty from "Beauty & the Beast"; the curse of death & sin from "Sleeping Beauty". But he goes on to say that we have lost that sense of charm, magic, the supernatural by our obsession with facts & scientific laws. We no longer believe in miracles. And we have lost our wonder at life because we are certain that pears always grow on pear trees and chickens only lay eggs and cancer equals death.

So my challenge for us in this thought is "How am I missing the supernatural presence of God by my literal interpretation of what I see?" It is not the norm to believe that donkeys can talk or cripples can walk or dead men can be awoke. These things are against the scientific laws of the day. But do you believe they are possible? What things are keeping you from expecting to see God do the unexpected?

A*Typical

So it was the Thursday morning after. I was sitting at my computer, thinking about the previous night's festivities - the excitement of all the new faces at our kickoff, the encouragement of responses to our new theme and the challenge to live differently - and wondered what I should do as a followup/response for all of that. And lo and behold, in my mountain of emails I got a link to the above video.

Besides being a really good song by a really good band (MuteMath is great - if you haven't heard them before, you have now and should continue to hear them) and an exceptionally creative video, the message of this goes right along with our challenge from Wednesday - How are you going to live differently?

As we talked about on Wednesday, I believe one of the biggest elements to this question is what needs to be made new. Not just covered over or taped up or temporarily fixed, but what do I need to let Jesus truly make new in my life. I want to hear from some of you. What are the things that you need to be new in your lives?

I pray that you are having an A*Typical day!

**By the way, you can search on www.youtube.com under "Mute Math Typical Forward" to see the video the way it was actually filmed. Pretty amazing!**

In the Beginning...

"In the beginning God created the blog, and He saw that it was good."

...or something like that.

So Calvary Chapel's youth ministry now has it's own interactive blogsite, which is a part of our new website, our new theme - 180, and a new direction for our ministry. Over the next few weeks and months we hope to see this blog become a place to exchange information and ideas. We plan on using it to talk about events, convey some ideas, let you in on crazy fun stuff we find out about, and answer questions (such as those placed in our Question Box on Wednesdays). But even more than that, we want this to be a place to hear from you.

We want to know what is on your heart. What is it that is keeping you up at night? What are you excited about in your life? What is hard in your life? What are your dreams? What are your nightmares? How does God fit into your life? What about church confuses you?

See, we all have these questions. And for so long there has not been a safe place to ask them. We want this blog to be a place of community where we can start to see that a different world is possible. A place that communicates how relevant faith in Christ is for today, even if we don't have all the answers. A place where we can converse about our journey and offer encouragement to press on.

When Jesus invited His first disciples to come and follow Him, he was offering an opportunity to get to know who He was. Those relationships changed the world forever. We believe that relationship can do the same today. So we invite you to join us in turning the world right side up! God Bless.